Dream Act Is Dead for This Year

Posted on Dec 18, 2010

The U.S. Senate has failed us again. On a 55-41 vote, the proposed Dream Act, an immigration reform measure aimed at paving the way to citizenship for undocumented students who attend college, has effectively been killed for this year.

The bill fell short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a Republican filibuster. Five Democrats broke ranks to vote against the bill, including Sens. Max Baucus and Kay Hagan. —JCL

The New York Times:

The Senate on Saturday blocked a bill that would create a path to citizenship for certain illegal immigrant students who came to the United States as children, completed two years of college or military service and met other requirements including passing a criminal background check. The vote, 55-41 in favor of the bill, effectively kills the measure for this year, and its fate beyond that is uncertain.

Most immediately, the measure would have helped grant legal status to hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrant students and recent graduates whose lives are severely restricted because they are illegal residents, though many have lived in the United States for nearly their entire lives.

Young Hispanic men and women filled the spectator galleries of the Senate, many of them wore graduation caps and tassels in a symbol of their support for the bill. And they held hands in a prayerful gesture as the clerk called the roll.